TL; DR – Don’t forget the slits!

My mom wanted a simple caftan for the summer, like what she used to make for herself when she was younger: “Just a couple of rectangles sewn together.” I offered to made her a ZW Envelope Dress by Cris Wood Sews, which seemed to meet her requirement of a couple of rectangles.

We bought some fabric together when I was visiting Montreal earlier in the summer (My god Fabricville is like heaven), with the plan to make the caftan before I came back with the rest of the family for a visit later in the summer. In the interim, Spoonflower was having a major sale on printed fabrics, so I finally got around to making a fabric from a few of my grandmother’s watercolor prints that hang beside my sewing machine.

Which you can purchase for yourself as well!

The fabric showed up the day before we were going to leave, so I have to really quickly sew it up, and I have to say, this pattern couldn’t be easier! The one challenge was that for both fabrics, it’s a directional print, so I had to do the measurements so that the stripes and the flowers were in the right direction.

I did French seams for both dresses, but I was in such a rush to finish before I left, I forgot to add slits, either one at the front or on each side. Oops. I ended up adding them while in Montreal and hand-stitching the finishes. My mom loves them. I’m happy she’s happy. This is one I’ll make again, but for myself!